WW2 Supers d6: SST 11: Mission Three: The Courtyard of Hell

[max_vale]

7:30 AM-Mid Morning, December 27-28, 1943, Ortona, Italy


The Hospital, Early Morning, Dec 27, 1943:

In the hospital, as the members of SST 11 felt a new Talent Power being employed, they all rushed over to where a young, teenaged German solider had laid hands on one of his badly wounded fellow Fallschirmjaegars and a bright flash of light came from his hands and the thrashing, convulsing German solider on the cot suddenly lay very still. Several Doctors and Medics got there at about the same time as several members of SST 11 did, and it was quickly apparent that the newly 'born' Talent had the power of Healing....

As Corporal John Porcupine got there, the young German paratrooper opened his eyes and after looking incredulously at his hands for a moment, he suddenly looked over and then took a big step back, his eyes terrified and he babbled something in German over and over again. One of the Doctors burst out laughing and then after a moment, he said a few words in German to the young man and then looked over at John with a grin....

"He thought you were gonna scalp him. A week of shooting each other and blowing each other to hell room to room and he takes one look at you and NOW is scared. HA! Who says War can't make you laugh.....or cry...hell, both at the same time....."

The new German Talent is noted and carefully watched, but mostly he is treated with respect......who doesn't have Empathy for a soldier who only wants to help his hurt brothers? Not long after that though, more disturbing/depressing news came from some troops bringing in many crushed and blown to bits Canadian troops, all of whom were covered in plaster dust....

Apparently, while the 'regular' German Army troops of the 90th Panzer Grenadiers had surrendered, the German Paratroopers were making their final stand in the area of the fortified Cathedral known as San Tommaso. Almost an entire platoon under the command of a LT Allan had been deliberately led into a house that the Germans had left a couple of wounded Canadian troops they had briefly captured and dragged to the building to serve as bait. When Allan's Platoon of 20 troops went in to rescue their fellows, the Germans used plungers to detonate the entire house, which they had wired to explode. Only two men had been dragged out of the wreckage alive....and one of them they didn't think would make it thru the day.....

This was 'dirty fighting'......it was one thing to shoot each other, shell each other, hell...run over each other with tanks, even. But to use captured, wounded men to lure the enemy into a house you then dropped on their heads? That was a bridge too far for many of the troops. Late in the afternoon, at a building near the Cathedral, Captain Bill Longhurst deliberately had a platoon of his Company pin down a German platoon in a building while a squad of Engineers planted explosives all over the outside of the building and then they fell back and he dropped the building on the Germans. An eye or an eye....

Early Morning, December 28th; San Tommaso Cathedral:

In the early hours of the morning, shortly after the sun came up on a cool, winter's day; the men of SST 11 were summoned to the front lines, near the San Tommaso Cathedral and found Major Jim Stone and a lot of men nervously waiting and pacing and many of the men cursing in frustration. Upon seeing them, Stone quickly marches over....

"Good, good...you're here. Jerry pulled out at dawn, but he left, well, a bloody OCEAN of those damnable cartoon mines on every rock and stone near the Cathedral. You can see from here", he says as he takes off his binoculars and passes them to the various Talents. Sure enough, a quick scan confirms that dozens of the cartoon mines have been drawn all over the cobblestones, random rubble rocks and the like, all around the Cathedral. "Several hundred German Paratroopers managed to get away as one of those damnable 'Ubermenschen' yelled out over a megaphone for us to not come near or we'd set all the mines off at once. Just a few moments ago, he called out again, saying that he wanted to speak to 'our Supermen', so here you are."

Soon enough, a megaphone is brought out and Chisholm talks to a German Paratrooper with good English who calls himself, "The Cartoonist". He tells them that he and and his last companion, "The Silencer", are willing to surrender.....but they wanted to make sure their 'little brothers' got away first." After assurances that they won't be fired upon; soon two men come out of the building, hands held high and holding no weapons.

They are in the dirty, well worn uniforms of two German Paratroopers who had been fighting hard in a city for a week straight and they were soon taken into custody after a brief talk with their counterparts in SST 11. The 'Cartoonist', pulls a note pad out with lots of 'mine' pictures on it and he tears all the pages up and the pictures on the rocks disappear. He explains his companion, 'The Silencer' is able to put out a sphere of silence and invisibility that allowed him to do his work all night long and allow their fellow Paratrooper survivors to escape. He also expresses his respect for them and his hatred for the SS Talents and he's obviously happy they were put down by SST 11. After that, they are taken into custody and the Cartoonist tells them that after fighting in France in '40, on Crete in '41, in Russia in '42 and now in Italy in '43; he'll be happy to rest in prison in '44.....

The battle of Ortona is over and as the men of SST 11 give a sad but respectful good-bye to Corporal 'Brilliant Bob Baker'; they rest and prepare to get on their transportation back to the First Special Service Force. As they do so, they catch a Canadian War Correspondent, one Matthew Halton of the Canadian Broadcast Corporation, talking to a camera and some of his words seem quite fitting in describing the Battle of Ortona....

"It wasn't Hell. It was the COURTYARD of Hell. It was a maelstrom of noise and hot, splitting steel....the rattling of machineguns never stopping....wounded men refusing to leave their posts......units refusing to be relieved after 7 days and nights of fighting at close quarters.....the battlefield remains an appalling thing to see, in its mud, ruin, fallen bodies and its blight and devastation of a once thriving little city....."

[ateno]

Koda would like to talk to the new pow's about the the teleporter on thier side and get information as to his demenor or style.

"We would like to bring him out so he may live like you will."

Not sure if this will work, but got to try. BTW, nice tip of the hat to Matthew Halton.

[kipper]

Agreed, we need to tie up that Karl/Carlo the Teleporter side story! Or maybe that's our next mission...

[Rex]

Nahum Chishom

Nahum will get what info he can from the German POWs and also see if he can find out who their new CO will be.

[Urson]

Porcupine
John shakes his head sadly when he hears about Cpt. Longhurst. An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind...

He has nothing much to say about 'rescuing' Karl/Carlo. He concentrates on rest and recovery (and trying NOT to scratch the itch of his healing wound.